The Maker of Peace

The Maker of Peace

The canyon floor holds millennia of weeping,
shadowed by stone where the old fires died;
here you stand, an antlered sentinel keeping
heavy secrets that the crowded centuries hide.

Your bronze chest catches Sun’s frustrations,
an iron spine built for endurance—not frail,
carrying the sorrow of lost generations
and the ancient grief of a tear-filled trail.

With arms stretched wide to the desert ceiling,
your throat is lifted in a shattering song—
a primal chant for peace and healing,
cast to the stones where the echoes belong.

In your right palm, the heavy wood of survival,
the sharp-pointed dart and the feathered weight—
reminding the earth of the hunter’s arrival
and the fragile balance of hunger and fate.

A golden loop clasps your weathering shoulders—
where borders dissolve and the ages entwine;
pigments of stories are sealed in the boulders,
preserving a pattern of sacred design.

High in the sky, a winged one is flying,
a beautiful soul leaving shadows behind,
lifting our eyes past the noise of our dying
to hope and to freedom where truth is defined.

You are the maker of peace when hurts untether,
the clash of the spear, the flight of the bird,
the damp heavy loam, the light-skipping feather,
weaving a shawl for emotions transferred.

No longer a hostage to time or to chasing,
your song fills the canyon, courageous and free—
a beautiful, timeless, and silent embracing
of land and of sky, of the stone and the sea.

Composed on November 3, 2026, in response to a friend’s Facebook post of her own photo of the sculpture. She shared that to her the sculpture conveys sorrow, joy, grief, frustration, and hope. She invited her friends and followers to post their own impressions of the sculpture. I tried to honor my friend’s impressions along with my own.